Brush at Wagonbed Springs
by TheOldWildHeffernan
Summary: A bizarre encounter teaches Chester not to talk to strangers–they never shut up once you do. (A brush {whatever that means} with the radio show.)
1. Epilogue (II)

"I'm just plumb turned around, that's all there is to it."

"What do you mean, Chester?" Kitty, Matt, Doc, and Chester sat around the table nearest to the bar. Kitty was peeling a hard-boiled egg.

"Waal. You jest wouldn't believe me if I told you, I bet."

"In that case, I'm going to bed," said Doc.

"Waal, now, I–"

"Nope, I've heard enough. Goodnight Kitty. Matt." Doc stood up and ran a hand along his mustache. Chester looked between them all, as shocked as it was possible to look slumped low and crosswise in a fairly comfortable chair. With his jaw set and his eyes so dark and ardent as they were, you would think he was not only handsome but quick, too. He raised an eyebrow and stared at Doc, with some very high feeling or another.

"So long, Doc," said Matt, without looking up from his newspaper.

"You better talk if you're gonna talk," said Kitty. "I think he's serious."

"Of course I'm serious," said Doc, and dumped a few dimes across the table. With that he shuffled towards the door, though he didn't really get very far for his motion. "I've got better things to do than watch some young indolent try and dream up a decent lie."

"Like what?" said Kitty.

"Swallow a tapeworm, maybe."

"Now...I don't think that's very neighborly of you, Doc," said Chester.

"Neither do I," said Doc.

"Well, _I'd_ like to hear what all the fuss is about," Kitty said, leaning forward with a look of absolute interest. Kitty could listen to almost anything and look like there was nothing on earth she'd rather hear, and nobody on earth she'd rather hear it from. She'd be a wonderful psychic, or mother, or teacher, or doctor. Or really anything. "Go on."

"It's like I said, Miss Kitty, why, you jest wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"There's only one way to find out," said Matt, turning the page.

"Waal, if you're gonna go on pestering me, why, I'll tell you what I was thinking on, but you cain't say I didn't try and keep it to maself."

"Chester," said Matt.

"Alright, alright. There I was, resting my eyes some on the stage from Abilene. Jest setting quiet. And this feller starts talking all funny at me. Puny little Texas drifter, he was. He said he was an army deserter, only now he's a dog-drummer."

"A dog-drummer?" Matt asked mildly.

"A dog-drummer. A feller what sells dogs."

"Ah."

"Yeah, but that ain't hardly the start of it. You wanna hear lies worth hearing, Doc, whoo-wee, you wish you'd'a been there. He was saying he lived here in Dodge, right on Front Street. Says he's a friend of yours, Mr. Dillon, and you, Miss Kitty."

"Well, maybe he is, what's his name?"

"Oh, you wouldn't be no friend of his." Chester shook his head and laughed in a contrived sort of way.

"I don't know. I've got a lot of friends."

"Oh, no, Miss Kitty, no, he weren't really no dog-drummer in the end, he weren't even no man from Dodge, I ain't never seen him here. He was jest some drifter probably ain't got a thing in the world."

"I've got some friends like that."

"No, he was crazy."

"She's got some friends like that," said Doc.

"No, I mean...he jest up and told me, why, he went ahead and said…" Chester trailed off and took a long drink of beer.

"Mm-hm?" said Matt.

"Waal. T'ain't fit for you to hear, Miss Kitty."

"Chester, now I _have_ to know."

"Mr. Dillon?"

"Yeah, Chester?" Matt looked up to find Chester staring imploringly his way. "Well, _I_ don't know what he said."

"You know...uh...you recall that Jamie Wheelwright, Mr. Dillon?" Matt thought for a second, then nodded. He went back to his newspaper.

"He was a bugger, is that what you mean?" Matt said, after he'd reached the end of a sentence. Chester coughed.

"For heaven's sake, is that all?" said Doc.

"Is that _all_? Why, Doc…"

"It's not as bad as all that, you know, Chester," said Kitty. "You probably know more of those than you think."

"What makes you think he was lying, anyhow?"

"I don't think he was lying on _that, _Doc, that part made sense, kinda."

"He told you this, you said?" Matt asked.

"Waal…" Chester shifted in his seat. "No need of you to go after him or nothing, Mr. Dillon. He ain't done nothing on my account."

"What did he say exactly?"

"He...he said he liked Irishmen." Matt put down his newspaper and sighed.

"Chester, _I_ like Irishmen. The ones I know, anyway."

"No, he was going on...he was saying he lived with one and his eyes were purty...stuff like that. And how he don't court girls."

"Did he say this at the same time?"

"I cain't see what the difference could be what times he said it at, all I know is he said it. He said he liked Indian girls, too." Matt cleared his throat.

"You know, Indian girls are girls," he said reasonably.

"He didn't make a pass at you, did he?" Kitty asked.

"No. Only…hold on a minute, he...he said…"

"If you had to think about it that long, I wouldn't worry," said Doc.

"Waal. I told you you wouldn't believe me."

"I believe the story, such as it was. I just sort of doubt the telling."

"You wasn't there, Doc. Don't matter nohow, 'cause he ain't had nothing to say about you as I can recall."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Waal, after the stage got held-up–"

"The stage got held up?"

"Yes, the stage got held up. After the stage got held up, we was at Wagonbed Springs–"

"Where did the stage get held up?"

"About ten miles out from there, Mr. Dillon. Me and the driver got the robber to bring him along with us, he was a real sorry old feller. He fell straight asleep once we gave him something to eat. Anyhow…" Chester furrowed his eyebrows and tried his best to remember what he'd been about to say. "Anyhow," he began again, "We was at Wagonbed Springs and that feller–the drifter, I mean–got into that stationmaster's whiskey–"

"Why not?" Doc interjected. "It's free."

"It was the middle of the day, Doc."

"I've never seen that stop you yet."

"Everybody knows a gentleman waits 'til there's a moon a'fore he'll tetch no whiskey."

"That's too easy, give me another one," said Doc. Chester stared at him a second before continuing.

"This feller gets drunk as anything, and he just went on talking and talking, why, you'd think he'd never get tired of it–going on about how he's got two dozen brothers, how he was shot so many times in the army, how he's got some kinda educated job–"

"Is dog-drumming an educated job?"

"He's a liar, Doc, forevermore, I don't know! What I set out to say was, he was saying he was a friend of Miss Kitty. Only I asked about her and he didn't know nothing at all. Fed me a whole passel of lies."

"Ooh, what did he say?" Kitty asked.

"Why, it was insulting, Miss Kitty, it was downright insulting and I think I shouldn't say."

"Come on, I can take it."

"Waal, I won't tell you...I won't tell you the better part of it, but...why, he said your hair was brown."

"You're right, that is insulting."

"That ain't nothing, Miss Kitty, he was making out you was some kind of a whiskey-drinking...adventuress, that's what he was saying!" Kitty smiled.

"Well, I do like whiskey."

"He said you was sad and lonesome, and that you'd fight a man what held your hand–"

"I would."

"–and he said you were gonna marry him!"

"Has he asked me?" Chester shook his head incredulously.

"That jest ain't the point, Miss Kitty. He said you said you hoped he'd marry you." Kitty laughed radiantly to Chester's face.

"I'd kind of like to meet this man. Sounds like a real Romeo."

"He said I was too clean," said Chester, scowling into his drink.

"Well," said Kitty kindly. "You can never be too clean."

"As a doctor I disagree," said Doc.

"As a woman I don't," said Kitty. "He say anything about Matt?"

"He talked funny."

"He said Matt talked funny?"

"No, he did, Chester what's-his-name, he talked funny."

"Who?"

"Oh, yeah." Chester laughed. "Why, if that ain't the foolishest thing–I forgot to tell you. You see, that's why it was all so queer-like–he had the same name as me."

"Chester Goode?" Matt asked.

"No, no, he had some crazy other name, some kind of an Indian name, I think. Had feet in it, or hands or somewhat."

"Was he an Indian?"

"No. Waal, I don't guess so, anyhow. Maybe half an Indian. But he sure don't look it if he is. I don't know. It was foot, it was something-foot."

"Proudfoot?" Doc asked.

"Why, yeah! That's it." Chester cocked his head suspiciously at Doc. "How'd you ever guess that?"

"It's not an uncommon name."

"Waal, I never heared it."

"That's because you're ignorant."

"Now wait just a minute, Doc–"

"It's Scotch."

"Scotch?"

"That's right, Scotch."

"Ain't that a whiskey? A 30-cent whiskey?"

"More like 40-cent," said Kitty.

"It also means 'from Scotland'," said Matt.

"That ain't too far from Germany, is it," Chester said, with a knowing nod.

"If I stand around here another minute," said Doc, "I'm gonna start getting stupider. I don't know how you do it, Kitty."

"It's easy, Doc. I rise above it."

"So you do. Well, Goodnight."

"Goodnight, Doc."

"Wait!" said Chester. Doc turned around and raised his eyebrows. Chester crossed his arms. "You ain't heared the part you won't believe."

"What's the point in saying it, then?"

"Waal…"

"Oh, for the love of god, Chester, just say it. Whatever it is."

"This...this Proudfoot."

"Yes?"

"It was getting on to three o'clock. We went out in the yard–"

"The short version, please."

"Doc, he fell over and he disappeared." Doc blinked.

"He did what?" he asked, evenly.

"He fell over and he disappeared." Chester snapped his fingers. "Like that." Kitty snapped her fingers, too.

"Like that?" she asked.

"Like that. The prisoner, too. And when I went out to the stage the driver was different, he could have switched, though. But I never seen the other fellers after that." Chester nodded, and sipped daintily on his beer.

"Chester," said Doc. "You've taught me something tonight."

"Yeah, Doc?"

"Yeah. I've gotta quit underestimating you." Chester smiled. "Just when I think you're through, you pull that one out of your sleeve." Chester nodded. Doc snapped his fingers. "Like that."

"That's just how it was, Doc."

"And that's just how it's gonna be."

"Huh?"

"The next time you keep me up…" Doc checked his watch. "...Six extra minutes."


	2. Chapter 1: The Stranger

Chester was twitching, dead asleep, and would have stayed that way all the way to Dodge if someone hadn't started humming, or something like it. Ordinarily that would hardly jar him awake. If the stage had been robbed, or lost a wheel, that probably wouldn't have, either. But this was real, hard-to-come-by tunelessness, enough to stub your toe on. Besides, whomever he was, he was cutting himself off now and then to say,

"_Well_. Did you _ever_ see the like?"

Chester opened one eye just a crack. The man across from him must have gotten on in Abilene. There was nobody else. That was as much as Chester had the strength too ascertain, and he'd snored twice when the stranger suddenly came up with something new to declare.

"'It's simply _vulgar_ with dust out there." Chester opened the same eye a bit further. The fellow might have been talking to himself. He probably was. He wasn't looking at Chester, he was squinting out the window in revulsion. "Oh, that's just exactly what it 'tis. Why, it ain't even hot. Just pure dus–" Chester wriggled violently into wakefulness, scrubbing his hands through his hair. He ended sitting a little straighter, eyes still bleary. His new neighbor had been sitting with his feet on either side of Chester's outstretched leg, but now he held them warily off the floor. He looked Chester up and down before settling.

"You sleep awful sound, don't ye," he said at length.

"Yeah, well, I guess I do, alright. See, I figure any time you ain't doing nothing else you're sorta missing a fine opportunity if you don't try and, oh, _rest_ a little." Chester nodded. The stranger nodded back. "You never know when you're gonna have to be ready."

"Mm."

"For action."

"I guess that's so."

Chester cocked his head and studied. There was no use trying to sleep now. The dust was too trying.

The stranger was older than Chester, but not rightly old. He was not short but little, not shockingly so but in that striking way of people who never had enough to eat when they were growing–but he didn't seem to be suffering for nourishment now. Under a duster he wore a buckskin vest–Chester would've called it Indian-style, it had some sort of flower painted abreast of it–and a shirt of red calico. His kerchief was green and his pants were striped, and altogether it might have been garish if it weren't all well-incorporated with dust and use. His hair was long-ish, but it went askew more than down–the texture of felt and the color of the dust that coated it. His eyes were some nothing color Miss Kitty would've called hazel, and some sad. He needed a shave. There was something crooked about his face, even though he was making no face at all.

"What's your name, stranger?" Chester asked.

"Chester Proudfoot," the stranger replied, and held out a hand. Chester snorted. Proudfoot took it back.

"Oh, I don't mean nothing, that's my name too, that's all. I'm Chester Goode." Proudfoot was a foolish name, but if it really was his name, well, he couldn't help it. It was up to Chester to shake hands now, which was alright, though in the midst of it Proudfoot suddenly began to cackle. It was a strange, soft laugh. He had kind of a strange, soft voice. Like he had dough on the roof of his mouth.

"Ain't that curious," he said. "Us having the same name, I mean."

"Waal, yeah. 'Course, there's no shortage of Chesters," said Chester. "Just underfoot about everywhere you turn these days."

"It's a fine name."

"Uh-huh." Chester stretched and leaned back. "Waal. Where're you headed, Chester Proudfoot?"

"Dodge."

"You don't say!" Chester leaned forward. Proudfoot blinked. "Would you believe I'm headed that way myself?"

"Y'are?"

Chester nodded enthusiastically.

"Guess you found the right stage, then," said Proudfoot. "It ain't stopping nowheres else, not now. You been in Dodge before?"

"Oh, you just best believe I have, I live there!"

"Is that right? I never seen you around there that I can think of."

"Waa-al, I slip by kindly quiet, time-to-time."

"Oh, I don't believe that."

"...You mean to tell me you live in Dodge yourself?"

"I surely do."

"Right in town?"

"Just off Front Street, most often."

"Most often? You mean you moves around?"

"Well, yes. Well...yes." Chester opened his mouth to ask where between, but it occurred to him that batty-looking like he was it was possible this Proudfoot was some very quiet-living Persons of No Fixed Abode.

"Huh!" he said instead, after a second. "Figure we'll see lots of one another then, now that we know ourselves."

"Be proud to," said Proudfoot. He took out his watch, and opened and closed it too quickly to actually be checking the time. He kept doing it. It had a good click.

"Handsome watch you got there," Chester said. Proudfoot looked up and grinned. It improved him.

"Why, sure 'tis! You wanna see it?"

"Waal, now–" Proudfoot had already unhooked it for his inspection.

"A man oughta have a watch." He slapped it into Chester's hand. "A friend give it me. Right nice, ain't it."

Having received it, Chester took a look. The watch really was a handsome one–filigreed–and it had a compass on the other side of the lid.

"That sure is purty, mister."

"Thank you."

"Is it new?"

"'Tis, or nearly. Got it in June. That's when I change m'age."

Chester clicked the watch a few times. "My momma says they all of 'em had the Ague when I was born...I take that to be sometime along about June. May or June."

"Yeah?" Chester might get him a watch like this, if he could afford it.

"Usually hits you when the skeeters come out...You mind if I smoke?" Proudfoot asked. Chester shrugged. "I'll kindly blow it out the window...well. Ne'ermind. Forget I said anything." Chester shrugged again and clicked it faster, and was about to say something else pleasant when Proudfoot snatched it away.

"Why–"

"Ague's a terrible fever," Proudfoot said, as he hid the watch away in his vest, as if he'd merely paused for thought. "Makes a man feel like a harp with a thousand strings."

"Waal, I never had it," said Chester. He hadn't wanted the watch in the first place. He crossed his arms.

"I ain't since I was a boy, myself," Proudfoot went on. "Fella what gave me the watch, though, gets it practically regular."

"Oh, is that so."

"'Tis."

"You got a cold, or something?" Proudfoot blinked.

"No. What makes you say that?" Chester shrugged. "I look sick?"

"You sound it is all, kinda."

"What a thing to say. A body can't help the way they sound."

"Maybe you oughter get your adenoids took out."

"My what?"

"Your adenoids. That's like your tonsils, sort of. Little Jessica Barry, she had 'em took out, and she used to sound just like you. Sorta–I mean, she's a little girl, but, you know, sorta stuffed-up and all like that." Proudfoot shook his head and muttered incredulously to himself. To Chester's point, he didn't quite catch it. "What's that, feller?"

"Why, you–I said _you're_ one to talk."

"Huh?"

"That's right." Proudfoot hooked his thumbs into his vest and stared at the floor. Chester was a little sorry. He grappled for something friendly to say.

"Where ya from?" he said.

"_Where am I from_," Proudfoot repeated, as if this was a foolish thing to ask. "Texas. Waco." Chester had planned to say 'that's mighty interesting' no matter what the answer was, but instead he heard himself say,

"You don't talk like no Texan."

"Oh, for pity's sake. You're so het-up o'er my talk, don't listen to it."

"Aw, I didn't mean nothing by it."

"Well...don't worry on it. I guess you've _got_ to be Texan."

"That's right. You know, I was borned in Waco."

"Huh. I wonder I don't know your people. The Goodes, you say?"

"Yeah. They're dead some years now, though. Since I was a little bitty feller. After that I been sent down to an uncle in Laredo what brung me up. Ain't got no family otherhow, except for my brother."

"Oh. I'm right sorry."

"Ain't nothing," said Chester. That talk made him sound sad, he knew, but he was only thinking.

"Laredo's pretty well down there, I been through that way but once. Finest Mexican food I ever had."

"They got that alright."

"You talk Mexican, living down there like you done?" Proudfoot said_ Mexican_ like _Messican_.

"Yeah. That is, I used to, some. Just sorta words here and there, though, you know."

"Sure. Better'n none. I could never get the 'r's right for that."

"Oh, takes practice, is all." Chester trilled an r and yipped. Proudfoot looked duly impressed.

"I talk some Kiowa an' some Arapaho," Proudfoot said. "Just words here an' there, like you say–but that t'ain't hard, they don't do no throaty sounds nor fancy letters–course, they don't do no letters t'all. You got any family stayed in Waco?"

"What?"

"I said–" but Chester had caught up. He shook his head.

"No. It was only just me and my baby brother left, and he run off directly. Next day, it was. Yeah."

"He did?"

"Clahr to the Dakotas." Proudfoot looked puzzled. "He's over in Arkansas now, last I heard."

"My. Weren't he awful young?"

"He was twelve. I was fifteen."

"That ain't so little. 'Course I don't guess it matters, losing your momma at any age, it's...t'ain't ever easy."

"Reckon not... You got a brother, mister?"

"Not hardly." Proudfoot looked grim. "I got ten."

"Forevermore, ten? Bigger or littler than you?"

"Well," said Proudfoot, "I ain't too sure what became of 'em all, but I'm about mid-size of 'em, I'd guess." Chester didn't dignify that. Moreover he didn't follow. Proudfoot snickered and sighed and went on. "They was seven of 'em older'n three younger. Two of the little ones is twins, though, so they didn't never have much to do with me. You know. Twins d'rather live amongst themselves, they can talk without talking. So it's kindly more like only having nine brothers. Nine and a half, you might say."

"They all down in Texas still?"

"My gracious, no."

"What about your folks?"

"My momma is...she don't know where I'm at, though, not no more, so I ain't...I left in '62 to join the army, I ain't been back since, and most of 'em can't write a lick, and don't care to, anyway..."

"Is that right."

"Uh-huh. But I hear Oscar's a banker in Albuquerque. And Ephraim's a hermit."

"A hermit?"

"Means he don't talk to people, hides out in the woods, like. But that was some years ago, see, most of 'em left when I was still little. My Pa, well. He was meaner'n a slathery dog. He left when I was four, but he come back whene'er he got...lonesome enough. An when he was about he kindly given everyone idees. Made 'em hate the place, made 'em ashamed. Pa's a smart man. They known him more'n I did, my big brothers. Some of 'em's mean, too...really just Oscar's mean like that, and sometimes Jake…" Chester felt his eyes getting heavy. "Maybe it's Ma's fault marrying him a'tall. She sure ain't too bright. Finest lady ever was, but practically ignorant when it come down to it."

"She couldn't'a been, bringin' up all them young'ns."

"Well, she know'd all about that. Never lost a one, and we had just about e'rything, one time or another. But she never know'd how to keep from getting beat on."

"Oh...my," said Chester. Proudfoot seemed unperturbed.

"She figured all a body need know is how to care for your own, keep clean, an' get to church come Sunday, and she had all that down pat. Taught us the best she knew how, those of us as would listen. But my _land_, she'd'a had better sense if she'd a' kept well enough clear of Pa." There was something in all that that didn't sit right, but Chester wasn't sure what, just that it made his chest feel heavy. "Why, just walking about she troubled him no end." Chester knew.

"It ain't a lady's fault if a man beats on 'er," he said.

"Oh, of course it ain't, but if he gets of a mind to beat her...you hope he don't, but…it's a man's right."

"That don't make no sense."

"How's that?"

"Waal, it…" Chester thought frantically for a long moment. "You said your Ma oughter've not got herself beat, but now you're saying there weren't nothing she could do to stop it. Sounds like your Pa oughter've jest not beat her. Or all them boys a' hers oughter've beat 'im back, some."

"Well, they ain't," said Proudfoot shortly. "You may be right, but they ain't. He had 'em buffaloed, maybe. I didn't know there was men in the world as didn't beat their wives."

"You ain't married," Chester hoped aloud.

"My _gracious_, no. But my ma–time come Pa let her alone, anyhow. I got to be near so big as him–I couldn't'a stopped him, but reckon he kindly thought I might. N'it like enough weren't fun for him no more. Anyhow, the day come Magnus cut him when he tried." Proudfoot smiled dreamily at that, as toothy and hard as a bite. "Cut 'im 'round there, with a big ol' bowie knife." He traced lines from behind his ears to the underside of his chin. Chester's eyes widened.

"Oh, t'ain't hurt him bad," Proudfoot said. "Just bled him like a stuck pig. Right up agin' the door, calm as anything. His own Pa. Magnus is crazy," Proudfoot explained.

"M...Magnus, you said?"

"He's my baby brother. You know, I figured he weren't fit t'live with people, but he growed up real fine in the end. I'm right proud a' him. Teached hisself to write, too–wrote me last Christmas he was wintering in Canada! You know how to write?"

"Uh. You see, I...well. Um. Yeah! Yeah, I kin write. Wouldn't you know it, my brother–"

"I learned t'in the army. T'isn't easy."

"No, it ain't. It's hard work is what it is. I–"

"Now, I'm not no _scholar_, but it's a right important thing to know. Especially in my line of work."

"Sure, sure...what sorta work you do, anyhow? You ain't in the army no more, are ya?"

"Gracious no, I done all sorts a' things since I got outta the army. I been a cook, a muleskinner––not for very long, but I done it. I had a job helping a dentist, once...I made it all the way over to Richmond at one time, an' I was a mail carrier there. They got mail carriers there, a' course...I was a salesman..."

"What'd you sell?"

"Lightning rods. Dogs an' lightning rods. Not at the same time."

One of the horses gave a piercing whinny, and the stage ground to a sudden halt. They both breathed soft and listened. They couldn't be at Wagonbed Springs already. The horses shuffled uneasily.

Proudfoot said something under his breath.

"What?"

"I said there ain't no shotgun messenger."

"Must be a holdup," Chester whispered. "Reckon we oughta–" Proudfoot put a finger to his lips. A horse came up beside them. The curtains were drawn on that side. Chester couldn't sit frozen much longer.

"Geddown on the floor," Proudfoot whispered. Chester did. Proudfoot crouched awkwardly to the side of Chester's leg, and moved his duster clear of his gun.

"Okay, mister," said the man on the horse. "You gone and made this real easy for yourself. Just keep your hands where they're at, and tell me where the cashbox is stowed."

"That's a fool way to do it," muttered Proudfoot. Chester listened for the driver.

"It's under my feet," the driver said–he wasn't one Chester knew. "I'm gonna have to move my feet…"

"T'ain't nothin' to worry on," Proudfoot said. Chester glanced his way and found Proudfoot looking at him, patient and crooked. "If he gets the cashbox, well, he gets the cashbox, and it's the bank's worry. If he orders us out, you just do as he says, just the way he says, and t'ain't likely he'll shoot nobody."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, this ain't the first time I been held up." Proudfoot turned back to the window.

"You haven't got no gun hid out, have you?"

"Just a shotgun. On the roof."

"Well. That's okay." Proudfoot wrinkled and unwrinkled his nose. "But can you shoot?"

"A pistol?"

"Yeah."

"Of course I can."

"Okay. If he shoots I'll shoot him, but if he should get me, you get my gun and you hold him, that's all."

"Wh–"

Somebody yelled. A shot went off. The stage lurched, the horses screamed, and one of them galloped away–the bandit's, Chester presumed. Proudfoot drew his gun, threw the door open and stood on the seat. He disappeared, accordingly, from the waist up, but Chester could still see him holster his gun and limpen-up a little. Proudfoot and the driver's voices came muffled through the roof.

"You alright, Jim?"

"Yeah, I'm alright! No thanks to you! You had a gun all the time?"

"'Course I had, but t'weren't no good. If he put the gun down I'd'a tried to pin 'im, but he'd'a shot you sure f'I'd'a started hollering."

"You coulda been riding on the box in the first place–"

"I done told you, I paid my way clear and fine and I _ain't no shotgun messenger._"

"Well. Don't make much difference now, I guess. Lucky for us he was fool enough to get his head upside of my feet."

"My gracious, Jim, you musta kicked him pretty hard."

Chester scooched out the other door and limped around back. It was a windy day, bright and quiet but for the creaking of harness leather and the wheezing of the bandit, who lay sprawled on his back in the dry grass. Chester stepped up, blinking in the dust, and kicked the gun from his hand. He met no resistance.

"I weren't about to kick him gentle!" the driver went on.

"Well. Let's have a look at 'im." Proudfoot landed squarely in the dirt, and looked surprised to be face-to-face with Chester.

"I done kicked his gun," Chester offered.

"I declare, you do get around quick," said Proudfoot.

"Waal…"

Proudfoot shook his head in amazement and took a knee.

"He dead, Chester?" called the driver.

"_No,_ he ain't dead," said Proudfoot. "He's none too quick coming around, though." He pulled the bandit's kerchief down.

"Oh, it's only a little old feller," Chester observed. It looked to Chester as if he'd be likely enough to faint with or without any boot to contend with.

"Got any water, Jim?" Proudfoot called.

"Sure."

The man moaned.

"You knocked the wind clahr outta me," he said.

"What'd you expect, tryna rob a stage?" said Chester. "There'd been a guard you'd like to've been killed."

Proudfoot returned with a flask and held it out to the bandit, who still lay prone.

"I'm much obliged to ye."

"Sit up first so's you don't choke on it," said Chester. The man did. His breath was whistley. He took a draw, then sprayed it.

"Hey! That's good water!" said Proudfoot.

"Water? What I need's a dram a' corn."

"What you _need's_ another firm kicking and someplace to set quiet an' _repent_, like. Man's lived so long as you oughta have more sense than to try and rob a stage. There'd'a been somebody riding shotgun you wouldn't be here bellyaching a t'all."

"He already said that."

"Well, he's right, that's all. Drink that down and _don't_ you spit it out."

"What fer?" The bandit drank piteously. "Yer gonna leave me here, ain'tcha?"

"Leave you he–? Why _no_. You're coming with us rest a' the way to Dodge, and the Marshal'll decide what to do with ye."

"Yeah," said Chester. They both glanced at Chester, then back to each other.

"What's your name, anyway?" said Proudfoot.

"Stubbs."

"That all?"

"Aloysius Stubbs."

"When'd you eat last, Stubbs?" asked Chester.

"Mundy," said Stubbs, and spat. Chester tried to remember what day it was today.

"Well, they et pretty good in jail where we're headed," said Proudfoot, less irascibly. Chester smiled. "Don't you worry none about that. Now come on." Proudfoot pulled Stubbs to his feet from behind.

"We'll eat before we get there, too. In Wagonbed Springs," said Chester brightly. They trudged back to the stage.

"I ain't got no money," said Stubbs. It occurred to Chester that if a body eats in jail, it generally means they're in it.

"Well I_ kindly_ figgered as much," said Proudfoot. "Don't you worry none about that, neither."


	3. Chapter 2: Wagonbed Whiskey

Aloysius Stubbs ate as much as Chester, twice as fast. It was no great shock when he heaved it back up directly. They gave him a little more–a little at a time–and a quantity of the station-master's corn whiskey, and by the time they'd been there an hour he was snoring in the corner of the backyard.

"He looks mighty comfortable, now, don't he," said Chester.

"He sure do fit there nice. Looks like a rake been put away." They watched him for a minute. Proudfoot checked his watch. "The horses won't be ready to go for nigh three hours at least." He held up the jug and grinned in Chester's direction. "Kin I buy you a drink?"

"Sure," said Chester. He worked up a grimace of sorts. He was well familiar with Wagonbed whiskey, inasmuch as it soon got him in a wagonbed kind of way–inanimate–and hurt on the way down. He'd still take a little. No sense offending anybody. It was free. They went inside.

"Could I have a couple glasses, please, and a sugar bowl?" Proudfoot called. The stationmaster nodded and set them noisily on the table. There was only one table. "That stationmaster must've picked the job for the quiet," said Proudfoot, although the stationmaster could certainly hear him. "You can about see the cobwebs in his ears. That oughta see all of us through, I guess," He said, nodding to the jug. He'd had a big dinner himself, even by Chester's standards. Chester didn't see how he could still have room for much vice.

"I guess so, yeah," said Chester. Proudfoot handed him a glass of it. Not a particularly generous one. Chester sighed, and came to watch incredulously as Proudfoot filled the other glass halfway up with sugar. "Ain't you gonna…" He filled it the rest of the way to the brim with whiskey and stirred it with a knife he drew from his boot. The stationmaster shook his head.

"Here's to Jim Buck's kicking foot!" said Proudfoot, and drank most of it down. Chester followed suit and coughed. Proudfoot pounded him on the back.

"Here, have a touch of that," he said, sliding the sugar his way.

"No, it's–_ho,_ dear–it's right tasty like it is."

"You wanna try it first? Here–" Proudfoot put his glass in Chester's hand and looked attentive. "I never could stand the taste of liquor."

"Why not drink a beer?" croaked Chester.

"Oh, I drink a beer if I got a beer," said Proudfoot brightly, and stared. Chester smiled weakly and took a sip. He gagged. It wasn't the taste–the taste was no worse, just sweeter–but he hadn't been prepared to drink a syrup.

"It's a wonder you got a tooth left in your head," Chester said. Proudfoot shrugged and grinned his bitey grin. His teeth ranged in tone from white to tobacco-brown, but he didn't have a bit of space between them.

"I always had good teeth." He downed Chester's backwash and busied himself, a little over-vigorously, in stirring himself another. "Never had a toothache in my whole life. Just lucky, I guess. _Ow!_ Why–" Proudfoot stuck his finger in his mouth and eyed his knife indignantly. "Been shot at a good deal, of course. You ever been shot?"

"As a matter of fact I have, yeah."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." He must have sounded some particular way about it without meaning to, because Proudfoot's eyes traveled slowly to Chester's leg and stayed there. Chester took pity.

"Oh, that...waal. That was shrapnel. Back in '65. Big ol' cannonball tore through a cottonwood, and when I got up to run I fell right down again. Pain woulda brought me to my knees, if I still had a knee, you know…" Chester laughed. Proudfoot didn't. "Anyhow, they figured to tie it up real tight and amputate if it got to fester, and it just never did, so. Guess I'm just lucky, too." He forgot himself and took another drink of whiskey. He spluttered a little. "But I been shot properly, too. I been...I been shot here…" he grabbed his shoulder, "and right there…" his arm, "and there…" his ear, "and clipped in the head a couple more times. What about you?"

"Pretty near the same on counts of getting shot. Been opened up between the ribs once, too, thought I was gone, sure...I always thought I was kindly prone to it, getting shot, I mean, but…well, I never was wounded in the army."

"Aw, that ain't nothing to be ashamed of."

"Oh, I know. It ain't that. I was just thinking. I guess if you're going to be hurt it ought to be in service to something. That's differnt than getting shot cause you picked a fight or sat in the wrong game. All thing I got in the army was jail fever. And that weren't no service to nothing, I can tell you that."

"Uh-huh."

"But then there's a feeling folks get about being in a war, too, that there's a certain number of lives getting lost and...bullets getting caught...and the ones as get took kindly get took for everybody."

Chester was embarrassed. No, he wasn't. It was something else. He cleared his throat.

"I reckon I know what you mean, sort of, and you sure said it purty for being two deep in that there–"

"What? T'ain't been five minutes–"

"Only, I was mighty glad to be out of it–"

"Well _that _goes without saying. I'd have been better off to run away home–if I'd've know'd how–and so'd nine out of every ten fellas there, I guess. Just makes you kindly crazy-proud, all that Army stuff."

"–and I sorta wish it hadn't've happened."

"Yes," Proudfoot said, after a moment, and turned his gaze into his drink. He blushed, but Chester guessed that was just the whiskey reaching his head. "Say, I...I always say I talk too much."

"Waal…" said Chester. They sat quietly for a minute. Proudfoot made himself another drink. The sound of the knife on the glass was making Chester nervous.

"You know they're makin' Colorado a state?" said Proudfoot abruptly.

"It's been a state, ain't it?"

"August 1st, 1876, it's gonna be a real live state of the union." Chester laughed.

"H...What?" he said, at last.

"What?"

"Well, that was…" Chester counted on his fingers. "That's six-odd years past, ain't it? Seven, I mean?"

"What d'you mean?"

"What do _you _mean?"

Proudfoot looked a little puzzled, and didn't come out with a reply.

"Maybe you oughta just, you know, slow down some, sort of." Chester glanced at the glass in Proudfoot's hand. Proudfoot followed Chester's eyes to the glass, then stared into them as he downed it.

"Well, I ain't about to argue about Colorado Territory," he said, when he was finished. "I ain't ever even saw it. Say, Mr. Goode?"

"Uh-Huh?"

"Can I ask you a personal question?"

"Waal...sure."

"Any reason how come you're wearing galluses _and _a belt?"

"Why, tuh–" Chester dropped to a whisper. "Why, tuh keep my britches up, why else?"

"You don't need but one for that. Seeing as you got no vest, well, you might make do without them galluses. T'ain't polite, showing off your...why, they're practically unmentionables, on a growed-up man like you. You ought to know that."

"Well that's...a mite old-fashioned, ain't it?"

"And you ain't got no coat, neither–"

"Well I _got _a coat, feller, I just ain't wearin' it–"

"Nor nothing 'round yer neck? Ain't you cold?"

"No." Proudfoot shook his head wonderingly and muttered. "What's that?" Chester said.

"Style, that's what. I ain't even said one thing about style."

"Style?"

"Well, I guess you wouldn't understand. It don't matter much. Least you're covered up most of the way."

"Style's okay for girls–ladies...hair styles, you mean?"

"Fashion, like. Taste. More important a man's clean, though. You're _awful _clean."

"I am?"

"Ain't ye?"

"Well, I bathe of a Saturday like any normal decent person, yeah."

"You sure do _stay _bathed. I hardly seen the like. Why, I take a mid-week bath, even, if it's hot enough, an' wash my feet about every night, and I still ain't so clean as you more'n a day at a time, seems like. Oh, then there's the winter time. I don't care for that a bit, not bathing. Takes me til February to get used to it, and then in March it sets to itching." Chester laughed.

"Oh, you shoulda seen me this last spring," he said. "I was practical crawling outta my skin, you know. Got so bad, why, I went and took some other feller's water–I jest couldn't wait one more second."

"That's terrible! Just when he'd got unsewed?"

"No, haha, no, I took it when he was done with it, like." Proudfoot got a face like he'd smelled something sour.

"I don't believe I'd dare," he said. "Of course, I can't abide by them Wells-Fargo tooth brushes, neither."

"Say, feller, ain't that enough? There any sugar left in there?" Proudfoot had finished another whiskey. Chester wondered if he might be trying to prove something.

"Oh, there's plenty there. Why, we fixed to go a-shooting? Walk a circus rope?" Proudfoot laughed. "Don't you worry none about me."

"You just drunk it awful quick, is all."

"Well, it's free, an' we ain't got all the time in the world. Figure this next'n'll do me. Your teeth ain't real, are they? They look right nice, where'd you get 'em?" He poured out the rest of the sugar and another measure of whiskey.

"Forevermore," said Chester, and put the jug under the table.

"Lookee yonder, Mr. Goode."

Chester yawned. He'd closed his eyes for a second.

"What?"

"Oh...jest wanted to make a noise, I guess." Proudfoot had taken off his coat and was balanced precariously on the back legs of his chair, boots on the table. The jug was back out. He whistled absently and Chester rubbed his eyes. "You know something?"

"No."

"You been asleep half the time I've know'd ye, but you don't seem no more rested t'me."

"Waal. Maybe I oughta get drunk in the middle of the day sometime, maybe that'd help."

"No, I don't think so." Proudfoot rocked his chair a little. The thickness in his voice had gotten a lot thicker. Chester had to draw on his patience to listen.

"Who's...who's your favorite type a' person?" Proudfoot asked. Chester gave him a bored sort of look. "Y'ever think about what your favorite type a' person is?" He seemed impervious. Chester gave up.

"What, fer loving?" he asked.

Proudfoot studied the join between the walls and the ceiling and didn't reply. Chester cracked his neck and yawned again. "Purty girls, I reckon," he said. "Either way. Nice girls, sweet...and gentle...with, you know, nice manners. With yeller hair."

"Oh," said Proudfoot.

"What's the matter with that?"

"Nothing! Nothing's the matter with that, my...my gracious, no, nothing's...no."

"I mean fer loving, of course, especial."

"For loving."

"What's _your_ favorite type of person, then?" Chester asked.

"Well, I...my favorite..._people, _in particular, that's...that's a different question altogether."

"It is, huh?"

"'_Course_ 'tis. But my favorite _type_ a' person is married ladies. With kids. And parasols. Like they got lots of all up back East. In the parks."

"Huh. That's...sorta unusual."

"An' have you ever met a _Irishman_, Mr. Goode?"

"I reckon I must have sometime."

"I sure do like them. I used t'live with a Irishman." Proudfoot shook his head wonderingly and blushed brighter than he already had, and Chester started to worry. "He come from a place called Dingle Bay, and he was just about the nicest fella you could ever wanna meet–"

"Look, Mr. Proudfoot, you're drunk–"

"–nothing ain't never seem t'bother'm, an' he–I liked to hear'm talk–I could listen to him the whole day long. And he had some eyes, too. Some eyes. Kindly like your eyes." Chester leaned back nervously, then forward to say,

"You shouldn't oughtter be telling me this."

"He tol' me if ye beat a Irishman in a fight, he'll be your friend for life. But you _never _punch a _Irishman_ in the _face_. Ye punch'm in the belly and he goes gentle as a lamb. I've made a lot a friends that way."

"Ya have, have ya."

"An' e'ery one've'em a Irishman." Proudfoot rested his ear on his shoulder and gave Chester a serene look. Chester felt a bit foolish. "They's purely easy. I sure do like them."

"Is married ladies with umbrellers easy?"

"Parasols? Sure. They'se mostly real hospitable'n all. 'Course, they's all differnt. Jus' like men is, only they're...smarter. No, that ain't it, they...they're women, that's all."

"Uh-huh."

"Without ye...well, ye can't talk to 'em like a man, but ye can talk to 'em kindly...ye can just talk to 'em."

"Well, you kin talk to anybody, cain't ya? You kin sure talk to purty girls, if you're courting them." Proudfoot muttered and shook his head. "Anyhow I cain't make out what them umbrellers got to do with it."

"I just like 'em."

"But you ain't...you ain't talking about _courting_ married girls."

"My gracious, no! That's just what I mean. You ain't bound to court 'em."

"Don't you _wanna_ court nobody?"

"Well, now, I just...a body just kindly likes to set'n visit sometimes."

"Yeah, but you kin court and sit and visit." Chester grinned. "Courting's jest like visiting, excepting you get to spark a little." Proudfoot shook his head more vehemently.

"Naw, they...they expect things of ye."

"Reckon that's their right. If you're courting 'em."

"That's what...you just don't understand!" Proudfoot waved his hands around some, to clarify. Chester laughed.

"Now, I ain't–"

"No, you don't understand," Proudfoot said again. "Don' matter none, I guess. You got to court to have children, though. I'd like to have children."

"You would?"

"Wouldn't you?"

"Waal. I like children. I like 'em a whole lot, some of 'em, an awful lot. I'm just awful poor. And they don't, you know, they don't let you sleep."

"Oh, you don't need money to have children."

"Waal, no, but they gotta eat."

"Only so much as a man does. If you can eat, you got enough for a kid to eat. All thing a little kid needs is someone to do for 'em."

"What about a bigger kid?"

"Oh, they get big enough you get 'em a gun, they'll eat, all right. I'm only funning. I'd find some way, you can always find some way. I'd provide for 'em."

"Sure."

"I got to–I want a daughter. I'd dearly love to have a daughter. A little girl."

"Yeah." Chester wasn't sure how to say he understood without _saying _he understood, which seemed like too large a concession. But he understood. "Yeah. Little girls is sweet."

"Say, I should marry a Indian! Indian girls, you know, they don't court like white girls do, but they're so tough I just kindly wanna do for 'em anyhow."

"Ya don't see too many umbrellers 'round Dodge, do ya," said Chester loudly, hoping to get on firmer ground.

"No you _suuurely_ don't."

"Excepting for some a' the saloon gals. Miss Kitty, now, she's got more'n one!"

"Miss Kitty?" Proudfoot's eyes lit up. "'Course she does."

"You kin talk to her purty easy, cain't ya? She's awful kind and obliging."

"'_Course_ I can! She's a–she's a friend a' mine! One a' my best friends."

"Yeah, Miss Kitty's friends with jest about everybody, I reckon," said Chester.

"I don't know about that. Wasn't too sure of her at first myself, poor creature, what with...what she...well…" Proudfoot coughed. "She always seemed kindly beat down, nearly, aside from her work. Dreary. An' a girl shouldn't ought to drink so, an' time was I worried she had scheming...designs on..."

Chester had slammed his hand on the table, and Proudfoot looked his way, waiting. Chester tried to think of a way to look that would make him take his boots down and act, at least, like he was speaking of worthy persons. All he could think to do, though, was frown and stare.

"That ain't no way to talk of Miss Kitty. She's a lady," he said, at length.

"'Course she's a lady! 'Course she is. I just never knowed it 'til later. When I'd got to knowing her better, knowed better what her mind was and how she was honest. And she is, true as north. It's only I can't stand a dishonest woman. Why, I couldn't even stand to pay 'em for, you know...pleasure–"

"Shut up." Proudfoot didn't look nearly alarmed enough. He stared at Chester with idle curiosity and scratched his ear. Chester noticed Proudfoot wore a ring. A bright copper ring. Chester thought a ring was unbecoming on a man–he might as well have had earrings.

"I wouldn't hire 'em, I mean, that's all," he said. "Not that I do besides. I don't care for it. Don't figure it hurts 'em none, some body's bound to–"

"Miss Kitty ain't in that line of work."

"Why no, she ain't, not now. But I knowed her when she was. Word was she did fast business, too, even if she ain't the prettiest, just cause she is that way."

"What way?"

"Oh, I don't know how to say it. Folks is drawn to her, that's all, cause she's s'patient. Only anyone with eye's'd know she hated it. You know, she won't hold nobody's hand now, even. Fella looks at her funny she turns her nose up, now she can. It's good for her, she's content now most often. Fattened up good. Time was I worried she'd end up replacing our Miss Brandy one day, all tired an' lonesome-like, but then again I ain't so worried now, Miss Kitty's a real nice girl, an' she don't drink near so much as she did. Hardly nought but beer."

"Who's Brandy, your sister?" said Chester, with venom.

"Me? Why, I ain't that old!" Proudfoot laughed. "No, I mean Brandy Crane, big softhearted ol' girl what keeps the girls outta trouble down o'er the Texas Trail, where Miss Kitty was a'fore the Allafraganza."

"She don't work at no Aller-no-place, even."

"She didn't work there long, she went o'er the Long Branch soon after, for Sam Noonan. He's a nice fella, that Sam. They was friends and now they'se partners. Imagine that. Quiet little girl like Kitty, half-owner of the finest saloon you ever saw."

"Half-owner–?"

"Sure! T'ain't as if a woman can't run nothing, not now, not in Dodge City. She sure deserves it, too. She fixed their prices up different and they make a lot more than before, even what with the strays–she feeds all them stray dogs, you know. Stray people, too. And you ought to hear her sing! Why, I imagine I was wary of her once, and I just can't figure."

"Mister, the way you talk I think you _oughta_ be wary of her."

"Now I'm kindly wary _for _her, Marshal Dillon don't marry her one day soon I just don't know what they're gonna do–you know I can't do nothing a t'all for how I talk, I got a hole in my mouth."

"What?"

"Babies with harelips got holes in their mouths."

"What?"

"You can fix the lip okay but you can't do nothing for a hole in your mouth. Was we talking about Miss Kitty?" Chester felt like he was about to have a headache, the kind that makes you see halos. He put his head on his fist and sighed.

"Yeah. You was."

"Poor thing's pining for a home somewhere, and little children, and so's Mr. Dillon, I think, unnerneath t'all. I mean that in truth. He's tired a' his business and he loves her. An' she loves him. But he don't think he ought to make her a widow s'young." Proudfoot laughed suddenly. "Well. Maybe she'll have to marry me." Chester wasn't sure what to do. Maybe fight him. Proudfoot might win if he was ready for it, but surprising him wouldn't be hard.

"Miss Kitty wouldn't never marry you," Chester said.

"She says she hopes she will."

"That's a lie."

"Course 'tis. She only swaps lies that way, on account I like–that is, I know about dresses and hats and foreign lands and things like that, as she likes to talk of. An' poetry."

"Poetry?"

"Poems. They's like songs, only they ain't no music. I cook better'n she does, an' I make her her cigarettes. She mends me my clothes and gives me the loan of her soap."

"So?"

"So we'd be happy sure."

"Miss Kitty don't smoke." Chester wished he could ignore it, but it just kept coming.

"She does, just not in public. Says it don't look good."

"Maybe she takes 'em off you just so's you don't feel as you're taking charity, huh."

"No, she smokes 'em. Used to smoke a pipe–I done too–but Mr. Dillon turned us all onto them little fellas."

"He did, did he."

"Yeah, but he don't roll 'em tight enough for my preference." Chester opened his mouth to say _Mr. Dillon don't smoke, neither, _but it was dawning on him that the fellow before him wasn't very bright if he was a liar, and otherwise he was crazy.

"You a good friend of the Marshal, then?" Chester said.

"Mm-hm. Best friend I ever had."

"Best friend you ever had, you must know him real well."

"I'd say I do."

"Where's he from, then?"

"Oh, that's easy, he was born o'er in Kentucky. Folks and him was pilgrims though come out to Ohio, and then when they died he come back to Kentucky. But it didn't suit him, so he gone out to Arizona–" he said _Arizona _like _Arizony– _"and West Texas, 'round there, and shot up border ruffians and things, a'fore he come up here."

"That so."

"Uh-huh."

"He got a given name?"

"Don't be foolish, 'course he has, it's Matt. Matthew on a check."

"You call 'im Matt or Matthew?"

"I call him Mr. Dillon."

"Uh-huh. An' how old is he?"

"Not s'old. That's personal."

"What's he like to eat?"

"Oh, anything. He'll eat it cold, too, but he don't never eat much."

"What's he look like?"

"What's he–? Say, don't you know 'im?"

"I ain't too sure, can you tell me?"

"Oh. Well, sure," said Proudfoot. "He's...he's some taller'n me, some...six, seven inches, like. Big man, but he ain't fat, you know, just mostly tall. Got a black slicker he wears all over when it ain't too hot."

"Good looking feller?"

"Oh, I suppose. He's more freckle n' skin, I'd say, and his teeth is all rotten...course none of that don't matter none if you're trying to find him on the street, he's got red hair–"

Chester snorted and tried to keep from laughing. He felt better knowing this man had never seen Kitty and the marshal, or probably even Doc and the rest of it. Doc, though, would probably enjoy him. He was contrary that way.

"–and you can't never miss a man with red hair–what's all that?" Chester had snorted again.

"Wh-what about Miss Kitty?" Chester managed.

"What?"

"What sorta hair's she got?"

"Oh...brown, I guess. Kindly light brown, but real pretty." Chester shook his head, and said,

"Say, what time is it?"

Proudfoot gave a start and dug around for his watch, and in an instant lost his balance. He crashed backwards to the floor and lay silent for a second, and Chester almost thought he might've passed out–it didn't seem possible, but it had been that sort of day–when Proudfoot unfroze and started cackling. Chester got up to look, and saw him still laying in–on?–the chair. He had the hysterical, half-scared look of an overtired kid who'd rolled down a hill too fast, or run into a door and hurt themselves.

"Look at yerself." Proudfoot thought that was very funny, too. "Honest to goodness, if we was in Dodge ya'd be locked up right now."

"I-I-I might at that!"

"C'mon, now. What time is it?" Proudfoot took a few shaky deep breaths and checked.

"Three-thirty."

"Ain't we leaving jest about now?"

"A '_course _we are!" Proudfoot clambered to his feet. "You just kindly...aim me at the door, next time it comes around, n' we'll go."

"Yeah, well. Aim yerself a second, will ya, I gotta go see to the prisoner."

"The..?"

"The prisoner, mister, the prisoner. The feller stopped the stage."

"The prisoner! Oh, my gracious. I–uh-oh."

"Don't get your knickers in a twist, I'll deal with him, it's my job, anyhow. But you jest better think about whose prisoners is getting left in whose charge when you figure ta go make a shame a' yerself in the middle of the afternoon, next time, maybe."

"Oh no, I got it."

"Look, you jest set tight, there. No, uh...get back to the stage, I'll be along." Proudfoot mumbled and scrubbed his hands over his face. "For heaven's sake, don't get to crying over it."

"I ain't either crying." He looked up to glare, and Chester saw that indeed he wasn't.

"Waal, alright." Chester shrugged and turned away. Proudfoot stepped close behind him, on the heel of Chester's boot, and Chester hopped to face him.

"What's the big idea here, now, huh?"

"Why don't you just call me Chester?"

"Forevermore, mister–"

"E'rybody else does."

"Waal, it confuses me, is the only thing."

"It's m'name…" Proudfoot looked at the ground. "Seem like such a nice boy an' you won't even learn a body's right name–"

"Alright, alright, would ya quit yammerin' a minute, _Chester_?" Proudfoot backed into the wall beside the door and narrowed his eyes. "Much obliged," said Chester, and made his way out back.

"Alright, grandpa. Time to…" Chester drew up. Aloysius wasn't where they'd left him. As a matter of fact, he wasn't anywhere. The fence was high and the gate was locked, and the old man was so–

"Time fer nothin', young feller," hissed Aloysius in Chester's ear. Chester arched his back, but Aloysius just pushed the knife–or whatever he had–to meet it.

"You oughter be ashamed," said Chester.

"You got a purse on ye?"

"No. And you ain't getting outta here whether you stick me'r not, so why don't you jest settle down some, and–_ow!"_

"Don't talk back to me."

"You're a nasty mean ol' billygoat, you are."

"Quit yer whinin'. I ain't goin' to no jail nowheres an' you ain't armed."

"Stoppit!"

"_Stoppit!" _Aloysius repeated in a grating, high-pitched voice and gave a ruined kind of laugh, and stuck Chester hard enough to break his skin. He jumped and hollered. It always surprised him how much it hurt to be cut. Aloysius was laughing but his hand was steady. "Don't you kick me or nothin', now. My daddy was a butcher."

"You–" Chester was, of course, going to kick him anyway, as soon as he collected his spite and nerves.

Instead, he dropped to the ground. He was already down before he understood he'd heard a gunshot.

"Don't shoot, don't shoot!" Aloysius howled. "I ain't done nothin'!"

"I coulda shot you perfect-legal, y'old cuss. Drop that a'fore I do. Drop it!"

"I done it, don't shoot!" Chester sat up, wincing. Proudfoot stood in the doorway with his gun trained on Aloysius, who, Chester could see, was trembling, with a broken bottle-neck on the ground beside him. Proudfoot muttered darkly to himself a second before dropping his arms to his sides.

"I'm a-gonna tie you _up_," he said.

"Don't _shoot!"_

"I _ain't_!" said Proudfoot, waving his pistol, loose in his hand but still smoking. Chester stood and dusted himself off gingerly.

"I'm nought but a sorry old man, ain't got nothing to git shot fer!"

"You're sticking glass into the infirm, ain't ye?" said Proudfoot.

Aloysius keened.

"For heaven's sake, he missed you by a mile," said Chester, with a twinge of pity. "He's drunk as anything. C'mon." He grabbed the old man by the upper arm, and he shrieked.

"Let 'im go, boy, t'ain't your worry," said Proudfoot. "You hurt any?"

"Jest a little. Look, I thank you fer the help, n' all, but you shouldn't oughtter go shooting in the air that way. Somebody coulda got hurt." Proudfoot opened his mouth and left it there for a second, affronted or thinking, it was hard to say. "Go on back to the stage, now."

"_You're…_why. You're _ungrateful." _He still hadn't put his gun away. Chester raised his voice.

"I've had jest about enough of you for right now, mister, I got enough to contend with and you're acting crazy!"

"I ain't either!"

"Aw," Chester put his hands on his hips. "If you ain't acting it, well, you plain are it, maybe."

"Why–"

"Watch where you're pointing that, will ya?"

"I'll watch where I right well wanna watch!"

That's when Chester realized he'd let go of Aloysius. He realized this when Aloysius smashed one of the station master's jugs over Proudfoot's head. Chester jumped back. Proudfoot gasped, scandalized, and took a single nauseous step before he crumpled.


	4. Epilogue (I)

"Chester..._Chester..._c'mon, now, boy…"

"Doc?" Chester groaned. His tongue felt like a dry sponge, and his head was pounding. Doc was slapping him about the face in a way that probably looked gentle, anyway. He could see, mercifully, that it was night, and that the harsh, limited, lamp-lit windows were the only thing keeping back cool dark. He wanted to close his eyes again. He knocked Doc's hands away.

"Yep. Stay awake this time, if you can—but lie still, that's it."

"What happened, Doc?"

"How should I know, you come in on the stage this way. Not a word of warning. Not a word of explanation, neither."

"That's not true, you heard him–it was the other Chester's fault." He could hear the position of Mr. Dillon's eyebrows.

"That's a good point, Matt, yes. My, that _is _a beauty…"

"_Ow, _Doc–!"

"Just looking, just looking. Yes, yes, that'll stitch up pretty as can be. Now, you relax, and let me see those eyes of yours…" Doc lifted the light up high. He held Chester's eyes open when he tried to squint. "Fine, fine, just fine. Now, are you sick to your stomach?"

"No. Well. Maybe a little."

"Your vision alright?"

"...Well..."

"What day is it today?"

"It's...it's night, ain't it?"

"What's your favorite kind of liver?"

"Well...antelope."

"Fine, fine. You care to sit up?"

"I guess so." Chester didn't move. "_Oh, _that hurts something _awful._"

"Maybe you oughta carry him, Matt. Looks like a pretty bad concussion to me."

"C'mon, Chester," said Mr. Dillon. It was only then Chester understood he was lying on the floor of the stagecoach–when Mr. Dillon grabbed him under the arms hauled him briskly out. Chester's knees locked when he found himself on his feet. The world spun so it made his head clammy.

"You think you can walk?" asked Mr. Dillon. He loosened his grip experimentally. Chester made a non-committal sound through his nose and found them touching again. "Yeah," said Mr. Dillon, in the same way he might have said 'no', and lifted Chester bridal-style without further comment.

"Come on, then, come on," said Doc, already off towards the office. Doc never ran, but he always walked at speed. Mr. Dillon trudged after. His spurs rang.

"Thank you," said Chester. His own voice sounded far away.

"Yeah. Don't mention it." Mr. Dillon said nothing for a moment. "What happened, anyway? Jim Buck says he found you out behind the waystation in Wagonbed Springs with your head split open. You came to a couple times, but you weren't making a lot of sense."

"Well, some fella tried to hold up the stage, but he was awful feeble...leastaways he sure seemed it, Jim Buck laid him out with one kick. Only other passenger was a young man, real nervous sorta fella with a bad leg...from the war…"

"Well?"

"Well, sir, the boy was just hankering to take charge of the prisoner, I couldn't make it out wherefore. He hadn't got a gun or nothing, not even a knife. Anyhow, I took this sorry little fella at least...at _least _so far as Wagonbed Springs…"

"I don't know if I ought to tell you before you say any more, but you reek of whiskey."

"Oh, well…" said Chester. He was abruptly dizzier and deeply ashamed. "I'm awful sorry, Mr. Dillon."

"For what, exactly?"

"For not bringing him in...I've not brung him in, have I?"

"You hardly brought yourself in, from the looks of things. Jim Buck said you were the only passenger."

"Well, Jim Buck musta got headfirst into that wagonbed whiskey, then."

"Jim never touches a drop on the job and you know it."

"I...that ain't…"

Chester sighed and squinted at the sky. It was sort of nice being carried. It made him feel close to someone. Probably because you generally have to be flush against a person, if they're carrying you. Close enough to smell them, and feel them breathe. Of course, Mr. Dillon was the only person who ever carried him anywhere, and only if he was bad hurt.

"I ain't bad hurt," he said.

"Doc says you'll be alright. You just got cracked pretty hard over the head. You kind of gave us a turn when you rolled into town all bloodied up, though."

"I'm sorry."

"It's alright, Chester. Stop putting your head back like that, you're putting me off balance."

"Yessir." Chester put his chin to his chest. "Mr. Dillon?"

"Yeah?"

"You smell fine."

"Thanks."

"Like leather, maybe...an' tobacco."

"Uh-huh."

"Yessir." Chester listened to the spurs for a few steps. Then he stiffened and opened his eyes. Mr. Dillon tensed up. "Where's the other one?"

"What?"

"The other Chester." Mr. Dillon have the barest pause, and said more deliberately,

"_What_?"

"No, the...the boy, the boy on the stage, his name was Chester, and, and...and it was _his _fault!"

"Was it."

"That's the truth! I...I remember it now. Sure I do."

"What, he hit you?" Mr. Dillon sounded impatient.

"Why _no. _No, he just...he gone out...Stubbs was tryna stick 'im with a piece a' bottle-glass and the boy kept telling me to get outta the way...before, I mean…anyhow, I shot past 'em to scare the ol' tomcat and this..._Chester..._he was _mad _at me!"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Take it easy, Chester."

"I _am_." Mr. Dillon hiked him up, and Chester hissed. They'd reached the office. "I can climb the stairs, maybe," he offered half-heartedly. The air lay like a blanket in the hall. Mr. Dillon kicked the door shut. "Grass."

"What's that?"

"You smell like grass, too."

"You know what you smell like?"

"No." Chester got very hot all of a sudden. It was awfully dark in here.

"A whiskey drummer."

The next thing Chester knew he was lying on Doc's table. The light was softer in here. It was as quiet as it had been downstairs, and a little stuffier. He took a few deep breaths and felt gingerly around his head. It still ached, inside, but it didn't sting so. It was all bandaged up and resting on a stack of books.

"Mr. Dillon?"

"He went out on his rounds," said Doc. Chester turned his head and there he was, reading from what he called a journal but was really, as far as Chester could tell, more like an almanac for doctors. He lay it across the arm of his chair and rose. "Hung around until I finished sewing you, though. Awfully neat work. Didn't even need to cut your hair. You'll be good as new soon as the brain fever settles." Doc was moving–Doc never really stopped moving; even when he was sitting still it was such a distinct change it had the character of a movement–and grinning at Chester while he mixed something in a glass, cheerful and sly. You would have thought medicine was something awfully mischievous. But Doc was wonderful, really, whatever he seemed like. He was the only doctor Chester had ever trusted as far as he could throw him, and that was before they even got to be friends, just on the grounds Doc never seemed to bleed anybody. The doctor in Waco Chester had never seen except through a haze of fever and panic, so perhaps it was no wonder he'd become a night terror. He bled Chester's Momma until her eyes rolled back.

"S'it late?"

"Oh, hardly. Getting on to midnight, I should think. Good evening, by the way."

"Evening...Doc?"

"Mm?"

"You meet the other fella? Chester? From the stage?"

"Why, no. You came in alone," said Doc. He was speaking so plainly he must have thought Chester was addled. "And Matt tells me there never was another passenger."

"That don't make no sense."

"Things'll probably seem a lot clearer in the morning."

"He was there, Doc. Big as life."

"If you're right, he's bound to turn up, Chester, and if you're wrong, well, your head got scrambled one way or another, it's nothing to dwell on. You get hit with a whiskey bottle, by any chance?"

"Mighta done."

"You have it all in your hair."

"Musta been, then. Only then they weren't no bottle, neither, they got earthen jugs out there heavy as sin. And all on account he was standing there looking down his nose with them big sad eyes a' his…oh, no. Oh–Doc, if he ain't come in on the stage the young fool's likely out on the prairie somewheres."

"Drink this down," said Doc, who had suddenly appeared at his head, and yanked him up to sit. "Very good. Now, come along to the bed before it knocks you out, you don't want a crick in your neck, too."

"You'll tell Mr. Dillon what I said about the boy?"

"Yes."

"You're lying."

"Yes."

"Either I'm plumb crazy," said Chester petulantly, "Or there was another body there, and durn peculiar, too." Doc took his arm and led him to the back room. The dizziness returned with a vengeance, but it was only a few steps.

"Tell me about him."

"Huh?"

"Lie down and tell me about him."

"What do you care?"

"Let's say it's a matter of professional intrigue." Chester glared. "What? We're just _saying _it. Oh. I'm just curious, Chester."

"Well. Alright." Chester settled back. "He was kindly tall."

"No," said Doc. Chester rolled his eyes.

"Yes. Not so tall as Mr. Dillon, maybe. Dark, stretched-out sorta man."

"Anything else?"

"His name was Chester Goode, he says. Says he lives here in Dodge, though I sure never seen him before today. Right skittery young fella. Tetchy. I was most worried, only he seemed like a real gentle sort. Kindly sweet and lost, like."

"How nice."

"Put me to mind of a blind collie-dog. Only kindly superior. Kept sassing me, an' he had no cause a t'all. He was talking about girls, so I started to talking about 'em too, and that got him all het-up."

"You say he was blind?"

"No, he weren't blind. Just seemed like if he really was a sheep dog he'd be a blind one."

"Mm-hm."

"Yeah." Doc took a scalpel from his vest and started cleaning his nails with it. He began to hum, but Chester could tell he had more to say.

"That's pretty elaborate for something you just thought you saw," he said, without stopping all the way.

"That's cause I _ain't _thought, Doc, I sure enough saw. You'll know him if you see him right off, an' I hope you all do an' choke on it."

"Don't pout, Chester. How will I know 'im?"

"He's got a stiff knee, that's how. Said it got blown out in the war somehow and ain't healed right–don't hinge hardly any. Looks right funny picking stuff off the ground, I tell ye that."

"Hm."

"Got around pretty good, though."

"Must be mighty fit, then."

"Oh, sure. And mighty good-looking, too. Ain't carried no gun, though, I thought that was kindly odd."

"His leg might make it hard for him to draw," said Doc.

"It's his leg, not his arm."

"Some of that's in the hips, you know."

"I guess...I don't know what you'd know about it." Chester tried to set himself on his feet in his head and try it out. "I thought you thought he weren't real."

"Well. Maybe it was some kind of visitation."

"No, Doc, he lives here."

"That is, maybe he really did appear...and disappear again...like magic."

"_Oh."_

"I'm serious, Chester."

"No you ain't."

"He coulda been a ghost."

"What would he be haunting me for, I don't know 'im."

"An angel."

"Don't be vulgar."

"Maybe he's you...in another life."

"I'm still _alive, _Doc, or hadn't you noticed."

"You're too contrary to live, Chester!" said Doc, like it was wonderful news.

"I could be contrary to dying, ever thought a' _that?"_

"_Contrary to–_contrary to dying, well. Yes. Yes, you could be, boy, you could be. Chester!"

"What?"

"I've got it, I've figured it out. Are you through with _A Thousand and One Nights _yet?"

"Oh...I given it o'er to Kitty, Doc, I was too slow with it. But what's that got to do–"

"You just want her to read it out to you. A lazy man will never see the world, Chester. _Anyhow. _If you _had_ read it, you'd know there's actually a hundred thousand worlds just like this one, that you can't get to except by magic. And in each one, there's just a few slight _differences._"

"Yeah, but that ain't real, Doc."

"Well, I don't know. Stories are always based on something. This one, for instance–all the time choices are being made, actions are being taken, that change the course of history. And every time there's at least a couple of possible outcomes. Understand?"

"...Sure."

"And the idea is that every time a choice is made, our world continues forward with the choice that is made, and another world goes on with the choice that isn't."

"Okay."

"Just bear with me. If all this is true, you and me exist in...well, in most of these other worlds. But we're a little different in each of them, since the worlds we live in are a little different. And in one of these worlds, Chester Proudfoot has a pretty face and a bum leg."

"Alright...t'weren't the only difference, Doc."

"You don't say."

"I don't talk like no Texan no more."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah. And you shoulda heared this fella, he was worse than Magnus. Besides, I'm _old_."

"You aren't a day over sixty, I've checked your teeth." Chester rolled his eyes, then paused.

"Can you really tell a body's age by looking at their teeth, Doc?"

"Of course you can't."

"Well, I don't know. You can tell a horse's."

"Tell me, Chester, have your teeth grown? Ever?"

"Well, they...they grew in."

"That's true, that's true. So more likely than not you're at least nine."

"How old do you really think I am, Doc?"

"Oh, you know how old you are."

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly, not exactly–nobody needs to know exactly, what's the use in that."

"Oh, I was only...I just wanna know, everybody else knows."

"That isn't true."

"Most everybody," Chester mumbled. He didn't feel so much like arguing anymore. He was feeling too sleepy and too generous; Doc had given him a little more laudanum than strictly necessary. Chester always fought it in the hopes that he would, and if Doc really, truly wanted him quiet he would preempt it. Chester didn't like to take advantage, in theory, but in practice it was worth it.

"What're they gonna put on my headstone, huh, Doc?" That made him laugh, somehow, and Doc shook his head.

"_Here lies an opium fiend_, that's what."

"Oh, I ain't no fiend."

"You would be if you could figure out how." Chester shrugged. Every time he thought he was through laughing he tried to take a breath and it made him laugh again. Doc went to the front room, and came back with a blanket. "You're thirty-two, by the way."

Chester face began to itch. He made sure Doc wasn't looking and chanced to scratch it.

"Don't do that," said Doc. Chester put his hands under the blanket Doc had given him and sighed. That made him laugh, reflexively, but not as hard.

"I gotta be older'n _that,_" he said, when it had finally passed.

"Officially you're thirty-two. Remember? You wrote the army about it. You said you were eighteen when you enlisted, which seems to me to mean if anything you're or thirty or thirty-one–I don't see why you'd make yourself out to be younger than you were."

"I ain't...I didn't know then, neither. Twas the army said I was…"

"Eighteen."

"Yessir."

"Suit yourself, then, you're thirty-three."

"See? I told you, Doc, I told you I was older." Chester was warm all over. He hoped the other Chester was, too, even if it was only because he was freezing to death on the prairie. "He were a whole own person, weren't he."

"Go to sleep."

"I will."

"Good."

"Goodnight, Doc."

"Goodnight, Chester. Stop that, I said."


End file.
